Friday, November 17, 2006

Each of our two vacation resting places had their own unique forest character. If you think there are a lot of pictures in today's post, you can imagine how many I had to leave out!

Chateau Mumu, our first stop, was nestled in among a stand of young deciduous trees, dominated by what I believe to be either Chestnut trees, Chestnut oak trees, or possibly Chinkapin oaks – or perhaps both, or something else entirely! They stood out to me because I had not previously seen trees with these big, wonderful, toothed leaves. Further investigation will be needed for certain identification, especially since I'm still stumped by many oaks. File the tooth-leaved trees under mystery.

Other oaks, Sugar maples (Acer saccharum), Sassafras (Sassafras albidum) and the odd evergreen also grew in the woods. I was particularly surprised by what appeared to be three young Douglas firs (Pseudotsuga menziesii), the likes of which I have not seen in almost a year (where once they dominated my landscape in Washington). I can’t imagine what Douglas fir might be doing in the Poconos, and I didn't see any of their cones around, so I’ll leave these up as mystery evergreens, to be identified at a later date.

The forest floor at Chateau Mumu may have been even more exciting than the rest of the woods. Great piles of fallen leaves scattered amid rain-soaked mosses and Pennsylvania stones made for fun investigations by the puppies, and plenty of fodder for my camera.

As always, suggestions for identification of the mystery trees is welcomed and encouraged. Next week I’ll give you a full review of the places we stayed, and of course, many more pictures from our adventures in the surrounding forests and parks!

Chestnut for the first one, and I'm thinking Douglas Fir too - boy, do these pics make me miss the woods to my north....here in the south, we have wonderful live oaks and bald cypresses and others - but the pine forests just can't compare.

Michelle, I have recently learned that Doug firs are also planting in Pennsylvania for use as Christmas trees, so perhaps it's not so unlikely after all! They were certainly a nice (familiar) surprise!

Caroline, thank you for the suggestion on the tree identity... I'm still unsure, but it's nice to know that some of my guesses may be in the ballpark!

Geraldine, thank YOU!

Pam, greetings, and welcome! Thanks for the tree identity suggestions (and sorry it's taken me so long to respond to your comments). I have to agree with you about evergreen forests - coming from Washington state, they're a staple in my mind.

Lené, moss is such a wonderful creature, especially when it rains! There was a lot of excitment on the ground that day.

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